Month: August 2019

The next morning we motored 3 miles over to North Haven. It’s much busier with alot more boat wakes from passing lobstermen and tourist boats, but quiets down quickly at night. We went ashore mid-day to explore and found a very small village. You can circle the main neighborhood in less than 30 minutes of walking. We stopped by Nebo Lodge (farm to table fine dining) to find out that they weren’t open for lunch, but made friends with the local neighborhood cat (who went so far as to fall asleep across Trip’s feet while he stood in place). We headed down the hill to Calderwood Hall to find that they only offer pre-packaged sandwiches for lunch, and pizza (which they’re famous for) wouldn’t be available till 4 pm. Even the local brewery didn’t open till 2. We grabbed a loaf of fresh focaccia and some fruit from the local farm, and headed back to the boat for lunch.

On our way back into town we stopped by Petronella, a bright red ketch we had seen several times over the last few weeks. Turns out they’re new OCC members and were also getting ready to head to Camden for the rally and mini-cruise. John and I started talking sourdough bread and yogurt onboard, Trip rolled his eyes, and we headed for the mainland. We started out at Nebo at the bar for appetizers (beef carpaccio and mussels). Our bartender Toby entertained us with her crazy travel stories (missed the ship 3 times on a carribbean cruise with family and had to find her own way back to the boat), some of which strained credibility. A local private chef joined the conversation, telling stories about cooking on the island. We bid our goodbyes, much as the main menu looked tempting, because we still had pizza to try. Back down the hill to Calderwood Hall and we got a pizza and beer. After all the appetizers, we only ate half the pizza, which was great for me because I knew the rest would be perfect for breakfast/lunch the next morning.

Later that afternoon we took advantage of the northerly winds (which shifted to the south during our sail, but still worked well) and headed off to North Haven. Having never been around the northern end of the island, we were in for a treat. A few mega mansions dotted the cliffs, but things were pretty isolated and we only passed one lobster boat and one sailboat at anchor. We came around the northeastern point, down into the Little Thoroughfare. We dropped anchor just past a ketch and had nearly the whole spot to ourselves. It’s an interesting waterway, too shallow for lobster pots (only 25 feet deep) and very few homes, so you can anchor pretty much anywhere. A charter schooner came along and also dropped anchor later on that night. It turns out Burnt Island and Calderwood Island are perfect stops for hiking, beaches, and they do lobster bakes for the guests here.

After a beautiful sunset and an absolutely spectacular sunrise (got up at 5:30 to use the head, peered out the portholes, and grabbed my phone immediately to go take pictures), we dinghied over to Burnt Island to hike. The trail leads around the entire island and takes an hour if you hold a steady pace – more like 90 minutes if you stroll and stop to explore – or to check email. We got to the northeast corner of the island and our phones suddenly started beeping. In such an isolated spot, we suddenly had three bars, full service and we stopped for a technology break. We finished the hike, including visiting a creepy old dilapidated house on the grounds, and headed back to the boat. We had originally planned on heading over to the village of North Haven, but opted to spend another night since it was such a lovely spot.

We headed back to anchor at Warren Island so we could explore more of Isleboro. We tried to hike Warren Island the next morning, but the mosquitoes were out of control and the hike turned into a forced march, and finally a run. I’m normally the one in any crowd who gets eaten alive by mosquitoes, but it was poor Lawrence’s turn that morning. We escaped back to the boat and got out the folding bikes.

Isleboro is big (13 miles long) and there aren’t trails or really much of a shoulder to roads, so it’s not optimal for walking. It’s great for the bikes though, if you don’t mind alot of hills. Isleboro is home to a lot of mega millionaires, and the homes on the shoreline show it, but it’s also home to much more modest folk as well. As we biked along we could enjoy simple cottage style homes opening up to the water every once in a while. We passed through town: a community center, cafe, post office, market and gallery (locals are convinced the island has kept it’s charm and lack of crime by not having any hotels or bars). We continued on till we found the library. Though it was closed (most island libraries are only open limited days of the week), it had wifi available 24/7, even if you had to stand at the door to pick up the signal. Out came the phones to check emails & messages, and the ipads to download more episodes of Stranger Things from Netflix.

Knowing that we still had to head back and wanted to visit local port officers, we turned around rather than trying to get to the end of the island. Later looking at a map I realized what a great decision that was – it would take a full day to bike the island given the hills. We stopped at the market for a few things, and then headed to Dick and Kathy de Grasse, local port officers for the OCC. They’ve owned their property on Isleboro since 1968 and built their own lovely compound and gardens. Fellow cruisers Bill & Bunny Bailey of s/v Onset stopped by as well, and we had a great afternoon chat about Isleboro, Maine, and cruising in general.

We headed back to the boat for a final round of cocktails with Lawrence & Viviane. The next morning we had intended on heading back to the island to bike and see more, but instead got a late start and only went across to visit the light house museum. It was a great museum with lots of artifacts, but unfortunately like all the other lighthouses in Maine, the fresnel lens had been removed and replaced with LED lights. I know they’re cheaper and more efficient, but it’s a shame to see the old lens – real works of art – removed.

Going our separate ways Friday, we went back to Rockland as our friend Meghan was coming up to spend the weekend with us. She drove up from Boston on Saturday morning and we managed to get groceries and have lunch in between a few wicked thunderstorms that passed through.

Cocktail hour started on the boat, which morphed into grilled cheese sandwiches and soup for dinner (it may be August, but it’s Maine and it’s dropping into the 50’s at night!), followed by Baileys on ice in the cockpit while we looked plaintively for the Perseid meteor shower (turns out we were a couple of days early for the height of the meteor shower and it’s not likely to be as good this year because it coincides with a nearly full moon which will drown some of them out).

Next morning, after lots of coffee, bacon and wild Maine blueberry (the tiniest, juiciest, best berry you will ever taste) pancakes, we headed off to Beech Hill Preserve. Just a few miles north of Rockland, it’s a beautiful hike that leads to a stone hut with a sod roof surrounded by blueberry shrubs overlooking Penobscot Bay. What a beautiful location!

The hike was short, so as we headed back into town we detoured to the path going out to the Rockland Lighthouse. It’s nearly a mile long walk each way over a granite boulder breakwater, but the views were fabulous and it was fun to visit a place we had sailed by so many times (and could currently see from the boat).

After both hikes our legs were telling us we needed a break, so we stopped by the Landings Marina Restaurant for sandwiches that featured their killer bacon (slabs more like ham, home smoked). We finished that off with ice cream, and Meghan headed home. A great, but too-short visit.

After a fun afternoon & evening in Belfast, we headed south the next day to Warren Island on Isleboros west side to meet up with Tanqueray again. I knew that Looma IV was leaving Camden tomorrow, so I let them know where we were heading and they messaged that they would join us there too.

Trip and I picked up Viviane in the dinghy and we went ashore for a short hike around the island to get some exercise. There’s multiple campsites which you get to via kayak, canoe, or small motorboat, but the trails gave the campers plenty of privacy when we walked by.

We got back to the boat and battened down the hatches as the skies opened up that night. There was thunder and lightning along with torrential rain that lasted for hours. Snug and warm down in our cabin, all I could think of were the campers on the island. We later ran into one of them whose canoe had filled with water and sank (including his outboard!). He was forced into paddling back across the bay. His comments about the storm: “It was pretty cool to watch the lightning the first few hours, but then with all the rain, it got old really fast”.

Looma IV sailed in the next day and we hosted cocktails on board to introduce Mads & Lotta to Lawrence & Viviane. Even though we all planned on leaving the next day, we agreed to an early hike together on the island the next morning.

We woke to crazy but typical Maine fog, and I managed to get some really good shots of Looma IV. Luckily it burned off in time for a nice walk around the island, including sampling of the local wild raspberries.

The winds were just right and we had heard too many times how great Belfast was, so we decided to visit. It was a slow, easy jib run from Pulpit that turned into a wicked, fun jib run (7.2 knots under half a jib) as the winds picked up far beyond the predictions in the afternoon.

We got lucky and got a mooring just off the main town dock. Belfast is described as Maine’s largest small town and they live up to it. Relatively compact, easy to walk, beautiful to look at, the hardest part was leaving some of the local shops and picking a place to eat amongst all the options. We settled on Rollie’s, a local institution, and had a great meal at the bar. We picked up some good local cheeses at a local shop, and then headed to the local co-op, which the town is famous for. Organic vegetables, fair trade coffees, artisanal breads, reasonable prices – what a dream.

My only complaint is that our cell service has been horrible. We switched to Google Fi in February so as to avoid international charges when we travel, and the coverage had been excellent and much more affordable than our old plans. Unfortunately, Maine is the test. The phones work just fine in cities like Portland and Rockland, but we’ve hit utter dead zones in Camden, North Haven, and now Belfast. Luckily we had wifi from the Harbormaster’s office in Belfast, and ironically we have great coverage under sail in the middle of Penobscot bay, but the lack of coverage in towns is becoming rather frustrating.

Pulpit Harbor is one of the great overnight stops in Penobscot Bay. We avoid it on the weekends (too busy with crowds from Rockland and Camden), but we got in Sunday afternoon after a great beam reach run across the bay. We dropped anchor and then proceeded to watch a boat from Massachusetts attempt to anchor not one, or two, but five times. Poor anchoring technique and faulty crew (not letting the anchor set and gunning the engine) made things difficult for them, but they finally anchored in a spot where if they dragged, it wouldn’t be down on us.

Lawrence and Viviane arrived a couple of hours later and we had a lovely cocktail hour aboard Tanqueray. Then it was back on board to start dinner, alternating with popping up into the cockpit to watch the spectacular sunset.

The next morning we watched more anchoring mishaps, as a trio of Canadian sailboats took forever to up anchor, (more importantly) clean the mud off the chain, and manage their dinghies as they left the harbor. We opted to stay another day, so after a morning row Trip set up the sailing rig on the dinghy. We sailed down to the public dock and went for a walk to explore a bit of North Haven, stretch our legs, and check out the local grocery store.

We got back to the boat to find a sailing mega yacht named Thistle anchored next to us. Over cocktails in our cockpit with Lawrence and Viviane, we watched what appeared to be a high end engagement party on Thistle (or that’s the story I made up).

Natalie left, we cleaned up the boat and did laundry, re-provisioned, and suddenly it was my birthday! It was hot, by Maine standards anyway, so we ducked into the Farnsworth Art Museum for an air-conditioned visit. I wasn’t particularly impressed with some of the newer exhibits (paintings from the 1950’s of every day life just don’t do it for me), but we loved the Wyeth exhibit of painters grandfather NC, father Andrew, and son Jamie, especially as much of the art was from local Maine spots which we’ve visited recently, such as Monhegan.

For lunch we managed to snag a spot at Café Miranda, one of the more popular local restaurants and where we’d had dinner two years ago (still just as delicious). After that, it was back to the boat and a chance to welcome friend Lawrence, who was on his way back from his solo sailing adventure to Canada. It was a blast to catch up with him on all of his recent sailing stops. We plan to spend a bit of time with him and Viviane when she arrives in two days for her summer vacation.

We had seen the documentary Maiden about Tracy Edwards and the all female crew in the 1989 round the world Whitbread sailing race back in Boston in June, and had actually met Tracy at a Q&A after the screening. It was showing again up in Rockland, so we talked Lawrence and Viviane into going. It was just as good the second time around, and we capped off the evening over hearty meals at a local Italian restaurant.